Violent protests in France over state of education lead to closure of nearly 400 schools

A protester throws a stop sign into a fire as protesting students carry out a blockade near a high school in Brest, France, on Friday. For several days, in protests that started in the Paris region, students have held demonstrations over grievances ranging from timetables and class sizes, to teacher shortages and overheated classrooms. (Fred Tanneau/AFP/Getty Images)Social SharingAbout 400 schools in France are expected to remain closed on Friday after student protests over education-related grievances ‌turned violent in some places.

The protests against teacher shortages and dilapidated school buildings erupted in the Paris region last month but have turned increasingly violent as they spread nationwide, with dozens injured and ​police making hundreds of arrests.

The demonstrations and blockades have become a political flashpoint at a sensitive moment for the government, which announced a series of spending cuts in its 2027 budget on Thursday.

"There is an ​active and violent minority … We're not entirely sure that they are even high school students themselves," Justice Minister Gérald Darmanin ​told RTL radio on Friday, adding that 2,000 people had been ⁠arrested since the ⁠protests began, with about two-thirds placed ‌in police custody.

"We have gone from high school student demonstrations to a public order disturbance. When people target buses and set schools on fire, it is no longer simply a protest issue," he said.

In an ⁠interview with broadcaster France 2 on Thursday evening, French Education Minister Édouard Geffray said that "a little over 400 schools and other educational establishments" would remain closed on Friday.

High school students and education trade union members attend a rally outside the rectorate, the regional education authority, in Bordeaux, France, on Friday. (Philippe Lopez/AFP/Getty Images)Some of the worst unrest on Thursday was in Marseille, France's second largest city. At Victor Hugo high school, two teachers were inadvertently splashed as a student attempted to throw gasoline into a trash bin. Earlier, the prosecutor's office had said the teachers had been assaulted.

Outside Marseille's Saint-Exupery high school, hundreds of young people forced firefighters to flee their truck and then set it alight. Public transport in the city was suspended after staff members were injured in the unrest.

A school was set ablaze in the western city of Nantes, fire crews said, and the facade of another suffered fire damage in Le Havre, in the north.

In the Parisian suburb of Saint-Denis, crowds of young people massed in front of a line of police. One student held up a sign that read: "Can we explain ourselves without being tear gassed?"

Geffray said he would meet representatives of staff unions, parent associations and student associations on Friday.